


flip it on its head

by frozensight



Series: a whole new world (literally) [18]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-24 02:10:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8352208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frozensight/pseuds/frozensight
Summary: There's a fifty percent chance something good will come of this, Josh muses, but on the flip side, there's a fifty percent chance it could go horribly, horribly wrong.





	

**Author's Note:**

> prompt: I decided to flip a coin about every decision in my life for a week and that’s how we ended up on a date
> 
> notes: i told myself i wouldn't write fic for this movie...and then...i did. i should've known the cowboys would get me.

"Tails, you ask out that red head at that table over there." Josh follows Teddy's finger to where he sees a pretty little thing smiling as she chats with her friends around a standing table. He can't help the grin that snakes over his face.

"And if I get heads?" he asks, tapping a quarter on the table of their booth.

Teddy hums as he glances around before he goes, "Ah!" and smirks. Pointing over towards the bar, Teddy replies, "Heads, you gotta go ask out that fella on the end there."

Josh narrows his eyes as he turns to look where Teddy's pointing. There, at the end of the bar, sits a man in a nice suit, who if the number of empty shot glasses in front of him is any indication, is looking to forget something. Josh can definitely relate, but he's been working on turning over a new leaf lately--hence why he's been flipping the damn coin to begin with. Scowling at Teddy, Josh asks, "Why him? He looks like he's already got a date with regret."

"He just seems like gettin' hit on could maybe cheer him up," is Teddy's response as he shrugs. Josh spares a moment to wish that the few older co-workers he had were worth hanging out with, so he could be out with people closer to his age instead of this child who only turned twenty-one two months ago.

He sighs and balances the quarter on his hand. " _Fine_ , but if either one of them decks me, you're payin' my tab."

Grinning, Teddy nods. "Sure thing, man."

Josh flips the quarter, catches it, and smacks it onto the back of his left hand. He hesitates in uncovering it, a little apprehensive over the result despite himself. Finally, he exhales and removes his right hand.

"Good luck, Josh," says Teddy, an annoyingly wide grin on his face.

"Fuck you," replies Josh as he stands up, throwing back the last of his beer before he straightens his shirt and makes his way towards the bar.

His target, Josh reasons as he gets closer, could be worse; he's at least good looking by Josh's standards. Teddy's definitely tried setting him up on dates before--and Josh can't say _any_ of them turned out well, namely because most of them were _barely eighteen_ \--so he's a little grateful that his friend didn't pick the guy a couple seats to the right, who seems to have walked out of the woods where he'd been hibernating and then decided to get a drink.

"Smells like it too," mutters Josh as he passes him and catches a whiff off him. Poor bastard looks like he could use some cheering up too, but Josh's altruism doesn't go further than that thought as he sidles up next to the man Teddy had pointed out. He stands there, leaning on the bar about half a foot from the man's arm, pretending that he's waiting for a bartender to notice him, when he's really just trying to take stock of the situation he's found himself in.

"I've found it's usually more productive to try and catch the bartender's eye rather than a fellow patron's if you want another drink," comments the man a minute later, his eyes looking straight ahead, though Josh sees them glance at him briefly.

Josh laughs, trying to mask how much he'd like to jump the bar and grab the nearest bottle with good ol'bravado as he pivots his body so that he's facing the man, officially dropping all pretenses of waiting for the bartender.

"Can you blame me?" The man raises an eyebrow at him, and Josh meets his eyes with his casual smirk as he rests his head on the hand propped up on the bar. "I haven't been able to stop lookin' at you since my friend pointed you out."

That makes the man snort and Josh thinks, ' _Time to pay up, Teddy_ ,' because it wouldn't be the first time he's been rebuffed before he can even introduce himself.

His mama always said, ' _People can smell bullshit, Joshua, and they don't take kindly to it when you throw it in their face and say it's chocolate._ ' It's a pity then that she also always told him that he was something of a pathological liar--' _A trait you get from your daddy, I'm 'fraid.'_ \--which comes in handy when he needs to talk his way out of something, but not so much when he's trying to convince someone he's worth going home with.

So he's a little shocked when the man flags down the bartender and orders two shots.

"Ain't you had enough?" asks Josh, eying the small pyramid of stacked shot glasses in front of the man, then the empty whiskey glass next to it before pointedly dragging his eyes back to the man's face. It's a good face, attractive even, but Josh can't help but get the feeling that he'd like to punch it as much as he wouldn't mind kissing it.

"Gracias," says the man to the bartender when the shots are pushed across the bar. He then turns slightly in his seat towards Josh and holds up one of the glasses to him. "Trust me, guero, I know when I've had enough, and I am nowhere close to that point. You, however, look like you could use more than just this shot."

"Thanks...I think." Josh accepts the shot and throws it back, the glass clinking against the bar when he's done, the vodka burning down his throat. "How d'ya reckon though?"

The man gives him an appraising look, and Josh can't remember encountering a more judging stare in his life except perhaps his nana's during the holidays. "I _reckon_ it by the fact that I saw your friend point at me, and then I saw you approach to, I assume, hit on me, only to have you stand there, floundering worse than a fish on land."

"I wouldn't say I was flounderin'," Josh huffs, "Graspin' at straws, maybe, but not _flounderin_ '."

"I'm sorry," begins the man, pausing briefly to throw back his own shot, "is standing awkwardly next to someone while trying to appear like you're _not_ staring at them considered successful flirting where you're from?"

Teddy, Josh notes to himself, will be paying his tab for the next _month_.

"I'll have you know, Mr. High-n-Mighty, that I did not, in fact, _want_ to talk to you."

"Oh really?" The man's disbelief is obvious from the mocking gleam in his eye, to how he holds his empty shot glass loosely in his left hand, to slight upturn of the corner of his lips.

"Yes, _really_ , but I had to 'cuz I've been lettin' a coin make all my decisions this week." The man's eyebrows shoot up at this, and Josh closes his eyes, wondering when the hell did his mouth disconnect from his brain. Holding out a hand towards the man, Josh opens his eyes and adds, "It's less stupid than it sounds, I swear."

"I highly doubt that, guero, but please, do elaborate as to how a coin has been commanding you all week and how that remedies your embarrassing actions here." He's smirking at Josh, which is aggravating and attractive and then aggravating all over again.

Josh glances back at Teddy, who--traitor that he is--gives him a thumbs up. He rubs a hand over his face as he faces the man dead-on, planning on explaining quickly and then high-tailing it back to the booth to drink and pretend this exchange never happened.

"Let's just say that I ran into a spot of trouble, and needed to...re-evaluate some things." That's putting it mildly, he knows, but Josh doesn't really feel like going into the details of 'I may or may not have recently gotten out of jail after getting caught running an illegal gambling shop' with a guy he's been attempting, poorly, to hit on. "An old friend of mine suggested that since I like lady luck so much, that I should put my life in her hands and see what happens. So," Josh digs the quarter out of his front pocket and places it on the bar with a soft clink, "coin." He gestures towards the man and adds, "Heads."

There is a moment of silence as the man's eyes are trained, thankfully, not on Josh, but on the coin. Quietly, the man reaches out with his right hand and picks up the quarter, turning it around in his hand before he asks, "You have been doing this all week?"

He shrugs. "Since Monday." Josh points over to where the pretty red head still stands with her friends. "She was tails, by the by."

The man evaluates her before turning back to Josh and focusing on him as he sets the coin back down. He still gives off an air like he's mocking him, but his grin isn't as haughty as before. Josh tries to ignore the fact that he's closer to the man than he was when they started talking.

"What decisions, besides me, has this coin made for you?"

Josh blinks, and then furrows his brow as he tries to remember if he's even done anything important that week. "Not much really. Let's see...It got me to try one of them fancy coffee deals at Starbucks the other day. Didn't hate it. Pickin' where and what to eat most nights is a lot easier now, I'll tell you what, and then yesterday, I couldn't decide between two movies on TV."

It seems rather sad, when laid out like that, but Josh supposes he needs to be keeping a low profile for the time being, at least until his parole is up. What he doesn't mention, however, is that he's been flipping the coin every morning to see whether he should have cereal or oatmeal, and he's had oatmeal every goddamn morning.

' _It's bound to be heads sooner or later,_ ' Goodie, his roommate's boyfriend, had said that morning as he helped himself to some of Billy's cereal, ' _It's simply the law of averages, my boy_.'

Josh shakes his head and focuses on the man again, just in time for him to ask, "What movies?"

"Uh, _Ocean's Eleven_ and _The Italian Job_."

"Original or remake?"

"Remakes, both of them."

The man rolls his eyes, and Josh doesn't know why that makes him grin.

"And which did you end up watching?"

"Neither." The man looks confused, and that makes Josh's grin widen. "My roommate and his boyfriend came back from their date 'fore I could flip the coin, so I had to bolt outta there unless I wanted to hear them knockin' boots."

The man laughs, and then levels Josh with a thoughtful stare, which makes the hair raise on the back of Josh's neck in anticipation.

"I have a proposition for you, if you and your coin are up to it."

He cocks his head to the side and tells him, "I'm listenin'."

"What if you flip that coin of yours again tonight?" The man illustrates his point by tapping on the coin. "Tails, you go back to your friend and carry on with your night, but heads, you and I go back to yours and, as you put it, 'knock boots'."

This, Josh thinks as his mouth falls open slightly, is definitely not what he expected to come out of the man's mouth, but damn it all if it isn't a tempting offer all the same.

"Why?"

The man shrugs, playful smirk on his face as he dissembles his shot glass pyramid and begins reshaping the glasses into a different shape to accommodate the two new ones. "I'm bored, and though your flirting could use extensive work, I'll admit I'm intrigued." He picks up the coin again, holding it between them. "So?"

Briefly Josh recalls how rude this man has been to him since they started talking, and wonders why he's even considering the arrogant bastard's offer. His pride's apparently gone on vacation though because in the second his brain thinks up the image of Billy covering his head with a pillow to drown out groaning and creaking from the bedroom next door, his mind's made up.

Josh takes the coin from the man and flips it into the air without a second thought. He feels his heart beat faster as he catches it and smacks it to the back of his left hand. There's a moment where he and the man lock eyes and Josh wonders what the _hell_ he's gonna do if it's tails, but he's beaten to the punch when the man calmly lifts Josh's hand up to reveal the verdict.

"Would you look at that?" says the man, a downright wicked smile on his face, as his hand keeps its hold on Josh's wrist. "Heads again. I guess tonight's your lucky night, guero."

He slowly looks from the man's shining brown eyes to his hand where the quarter sits, tails up, and then back to the man's eyes. Josh smiles. "The name's Faraday, actually. Josh Faraday."

"Vasquez."

"You got a first name, Vasquez?"

The man--Vasquez--stands up, hand tugging Josh a few inches closer so that their chests brush against each other. "Guero, do you want to know my name, or do you want to get laid?"

 _Both_ , he replies in his head, but out loud Josh says, "Laid, definitely laid." Vasquez nods, grin saying that Josh has made the correct choice. He releases his wrist in order to pull out his wallet, which is when Josh reaches out and stops him. "No, let me." He acquiesces, if only out of curiosity as Josh flags down the nearest bartender and says, "Hey, put all of his drinks, and mine, on my pal Teddy's tab."

The bartender looks skeptical. "He gonna be cool with that?"

Josh smirks and waves over at Teddy to get his attention, sending him a thumbs up when he does and gesturing to Vasquez next to him. Smiling widely back, Teddy returns the thumbs up. Josh hears Vasquez hum in amusement as he turns back to the bartender. "Yeah, I'd say he's cool with it."

The bartender rolls his eyes, but walks off to make the requested changes anyway.

"Clever," says Vasquez, and suddenly Josh is very aware of how close they're standing, "I do hope your friend can pay for it all."

"He'll be fine. Kid owes me one." He doesn't; in fact, Josh is pretty sure he might owe _Teddy_. However, Josh knows he doesn't have enough in his own wallet to cover _his_ drinks, let alone cover Vasquez's to make up for being awkward. Foisting his bill onto Teddy had been his plan from the moment Teddy had suggested they go out that night. "Now Vasquez, you wanna get outta here, or do you wanna stick around and chat?"

Vasquez chuckles, the grin not leaving his face as he steps slowly away from Josh. "Lead the way, guero."

Josh lingers a moment in Vasquez's personal space before he walks away from the bar, a smirk on his face as well. He waves bye to Teddy--grabbing his coat from the booth as he passes--and makes his way to the exit, Vasquez half a step behind him.

———

When Josh wakes up the next morning, he expects to throw his arm over the body of a still very naked Vasquez, maybe coax a round two out of him before they part ways, and then flip the coin to see about that oatmeal.

Rather than his arm landing on a soft and warm body, however, he gets a sharp stinging sensation across the back of his hand.

Josh lets out a strangled yell as he quickly pulls his arm back to his body to protect it, rolling over on his back to get away from his attacker and, incidentally, causes himself to tumble off the bed in his alarm. From the floor, hand bleeding lightly and body tangled up in his blanket, Josh looks at the other side of his bed. Instead of seeing Vasquez like he'd been hoping, sits a black cat, its tail flipping about on the bed as it stares him down.

"Koko," says Josh, eyes narrowing as he glares at his roommate's cat. "You lil' furry piece of shit."

The cat's ears twitch, but her gaze doesn't waver. Josh spares a brief moment to assess the damage done to his hand--not too bad since he pulled his hand away quickly, just not quickly enough--before he grabs a random shoe from the floor by his bed and throws it the cat. Hissing, the cat jumps off the bed and runs off to hide somewhere, most likely planning to piss on some of his clothes when he's not looking.

Grumbling to himself, Josh stands up after fighting with his blanket and shifts through the nearest pile of clothes until he finds some boxers that don't smell too terrible. He'd flipped the coin about laundry two days ago, but he's starting to think that maybe it's not so much of a choice anymore. He pulls on the first shirt he finds--a nearly threadbare white one he's had for years that says 'kiss my ace' and is accompanied by a giant black spade--and opens the door to his room, leaving the door ajar so that Koko can get out whenever she's done peeing on his shit.

"The boy lives!" greets Goodie from the living room with a grin on his face and his feet propped up on the coffee table. Pausing at the end of the hallway, Josh spares a moment to be jealous because whenever _he_ does that, Billy always sees and threatens to throw a knife at him, but when _Goodie_ does it, he gets gently reproached and a fond smile. "We were wondering when you'd grace us with your presence this morning. Is your companion still asleep, or...?"

Josh shakes his head as he stands on the edge of the dining room, where he can hear Billy moving around in the kitchen. "He slinked out."

Goodie nods, sipping from his mug before he says, "Well, I suppose at least he didn't linger."

It takes a lot for Josh to not say, ' _I don't think I would've minded if he had_ ,' and instead declare, "Ain't that the truth," as he walks into the kitchen. Billy glances at him as he enters, and then returns to cooking breakfast for him and Goodie.

"I take it your night went well," says Billy as Josh sets about fixing himself a cup of coffee.

He hesitates, unsure if Billy initiating conversation is him holding out the olive branch or cocking an arrow in his bow.

"Yeah," replies Josh, hoping for the branch as he pours more sugar into his coffee than most people think wise, "Met a guy; had fun. Good night, overall."

Billy turns to look at Josh, but doesn't say anything. His silence puts Josh on edge, making him afraid to even take that first glorious, scorching hot sip of his coffee. Eyes train onto Josh's left hand, and even if Josh wasn't a betting man, he'd still think that Billy looks downright _pleased_ at the scratches he sees there.

"Did Koko do that?" He nods at Josh's hand.

Josh scowls at his roommate. "You know she did."

This somehow pacifies whatever was brewing inside Billy, and he just smiles and returns to cooking. Josh wants to say something. Like how it's not cool that he doesn't get an apology for getting attacked by his roommate's stupid cat that hates him for no good reason. Or how it's frustrating that every little issue with the apartment gets blamed on _him_ \--even though he _knows_ it was Goodie who broke the garbage disposal the other week. Or how Josh has to put up with _them_ fucking like rabbits every goddamn day of the week, but he can't bring someone home _once_ in the month he's lived there without getting chastised like a damn child.

It's like he's still living with his parents, except instead of his mom and step-dad yelling at each other every day but Sunday, he's got Goodie winking at him as he complains about charity events and galas he has to attend for his company while Billy rolls his eyes and straightens Goodie's tie.

He honestly can't figure out which one he hates more.

But despite all that, Josh _does_ need a place to live and currently has no other friends besides Teddy, who is twenty-one and lives in a college dorm, so he says nothing. He just goes back to the living room and sits next to Goodie on the couch. Deciding to tempt fate a little, Josh props his feet up on the table next to Goodie's--who gives him a conspiratorial grin and a wink as they gently clink their mugs in salute to a night well conquered.

Here at least, Josh thinks, he's got Goodie, who makes up for having terrible taste in men, by annoying the shit out of Billy by liking Josh so much.

———

When Josh goes back to his room after finishing his coffee, he passes Koko in the hallway. He resists the urge to push her over with his foot because not only would Billy see since he'd taken Josh's seat next to Goodie, but also Koko would take that as the attack it is and maul his bare foot. He shuts his bedroom door behind him to ensure that she won't get back in anytime soon, only to be greeted by the aroma of cat pee coming from some yet to be discovered spot in his room. Josh sighs, hand rubbing over his face as he looks towards his closet, where clothes litter the floor.

Yup, he's _definitely_ doing laundry today.

It's as he's looking for the hamper Billy gave him when he moved in that he notices something that he didn't see earlier: a coin laying head's up on the pillow next to the one Josh had been sleeping on.

He smiles as he picks it up, turning it over in his hand. It isn't a coin he recognizes, with its silver inner circle and golden edge, but the context clues of the word 'Mexicanos' on the back, surrounding an eagle holding a cactus, leads him to believe that it's _probably_ a Mexican peso.

Josh balances it on his right hand, pausing for a moment as he declares out loud, "Heads, I eat cereal; tails, I eat oatmeal."

The coin is heavier than he's used to, but Josh flips it and catches it with well-practiced ease all the same. He places it on the back of his left hand gingerly, wary of the cat scratches that still faintly itch because he hasn't bothered to wash them yet, and slowly takes his right hand away.

He's greeted by the unsmiling face of a man he doesn't know, and Josh grins.

**Author's Note:**

> the coin vasquez left is a [$20 mexican peso (far right)](https://utacuernavaca.files.wordpress.com/2007/06/mexico_2006_circulating_coins.jpg)! if wikipedia is to be believed, this coin isn't very common, probably cuz there's a bill of the same value, much like the gold $1 coin vs the $1 bill here in u.s. also, [this is the shirt](https://image.spreadshirtmedia.com/image-server/v1/compositions/111443314/views/1,width=300,height=300,appearanceId=1,version=1472099614/cool-poker-t-shirt-t-shirts-men-s-premium-t-shirt.jpg) faraday is wearing at the end. it was one of the first results i got when i googled poker shirts and i laughed a bit.  
>   
> haha, so this turned into so much more than i expected? i have a whole lil verse now of ideas, and this is really not what i needed to fall into right before nanowrimo. i am, however, wholly unsurprised at myself for doing this.  
>   
> credit/thanks to villakulla for helping come up with the name for [billy's cat](http://guardianlv.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/black-cat.jpg), and thanks to goddammitamy for helping me come up with ideas to use in the future.  
>   
> how many reference links is too many stay tuned


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